


Indelible

by downjune



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, Recreational Drug Use, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-13
Updated: 2018-12-20
Packaged: 2019-09-17 06:48:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16969749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/downjune/pseuds/downjune
Summary: Everyone on the team tried their best to ignore Matt’s taste in men, but as the YCP rep and the only openly gay guy in the Metro division, Matt felt it was his duty to be public with his lifestyle. He was a role model, after all. His Insta was a veritable archive of who not to date.“Murr. My buddy, my dude.”“Yeah, Rusty.”“I think you might have lousy taste in guys.”Matt snorted a laugh. “Oh, for sure, I do. Good taste in friends, though."





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A huge thank you to sparrck for helping me see what still needed doing. This was a difficult story to wrangle, and you knew right where to push.  
> PSA: please mind the time stamps at the start of each chapter and the non-linear tag.  
> For your listening pleasure, [The War on Drugs' "Clean Living."](https://youtu.be/dPf3d8Hp7cM) The song is calm and steady on first listen but angry as hell underneath, much like our hero. The lyric below slew me. Tags to be added with subsequent updates.

Indelible

I ain't giving in  
I know my way around it  
I've been doing all right

 

_August 2018_

Matt rolled his sleeves up on his way out of the ballroom, needing some air. He could have taken off his vest, too, but fuck it. He looked really good in the vest. He was sweating into his undershirt, but so was everyone who’d been dancing.

The patio had a few couples scattered around, but Matt found an empty bit of railing and leaned against it. The moon shone on the water, and the summer ocean air was a tangible thing against his face. It was a gorgeous fucking wedding. Matt loved to dance, and more than that, he loved his team, so it was a good night. 

But watching the other random couples on the patio, the ghost of a twinge pinched in his chest. With both elbows on the railing, Matt collapsed a little into his shoulders. Going stag to a wedding sucked. Even if Matt didn’t miss Vic. Vic hadn’t been the wedding-date type, let alone the dancing type, but Matt was old enough to see value in the buddy system for these kinds of things. 

Dumo and his girl were married, and Matt was single. Again. Still.

A giggling, tipsy couple encroached on his space, and Matt edged away to give everyone more room. He didn’t give a shit about Victor, really, but weddings were for... They were about—

“Hey, there you are. It’s getting stupid-hot inside, shit.” Rusty bumped against his shoulder. “This humidity is intense.” Bryan’s hair stood up everywhere, and when the breeze blew from the right angle, Matt caught the scent of fresh sweat on his skin, along with beer and champagne on his breath.

“Yeah, I needed some air,” Matt answered. Rusty pressed close beside him at the railing and was a little too drunk to pick up on Matt’s meaning. 

“Me too,” he said and pressed even tighter against Matt’s shoulder. “Your suit is awesome, by the way. Have I said that yet? That vest looks so good on you.”

Matt smiled down at his clasped hands. “Thanks, man.” Rusty always led with a compliment. He looked good too, but that was status quo. He knew what kind of magic his smile and his shoulders in a nice suit could work. 

“You’re welcome,” Bryan said. “Hey—uh. Where’s your guy tonight? Thought you might bring him. Everybody’s dyin’ to finally meet him.”

Everyone tried their best to ignore Matt’s taste in men, so that was a lie. Rusty was the only one who ever wanted to meet Matt’s boyfriends. The front office would probably do backflips if Matt quit posting pictures of his half-naked self and Victor’s dad-bod to Instagram. The backflips could commence, because Vic was history.

As the YCP rep and the only openly gay guy in the Metro division, Matt felt it was his duty to be public with his lifestyle. He was a role model, after all. His Insta was a veritable archive of who not to date.

“We split,” Matt said belatedly. “Last week.”

Rusty frowned. “Shit. I thought this one was legit. He lasted longer than a month, so…”

He lasted almost five months, a personal best for Matt. Or worst, depending on the angle. 

“You wouldn’t have liked him,” Matt said. 

Rusty jabbed him with an elbow. “Come on, how do you know? I’m not like that, am I? If your guy is for real, then I’ll love him.”

“Well, he wasn’t.”

“Then I guess I don’t have to,” he said without missing a beat. 

“No, you don’t.” Matt grinned, despite himself. Flying solo at a wedding could never truly suck as long as Rusty was in attendance. 

“Murr. My buddy, my dude.”

“Yeah, Rusty.”

“I think you might have lousy taste in guys.”

Matt snorted a laugh. “Oh, for sure, I do.”

Rusty giggled beside him.

“Good taste in friends, though.” Matt said it and slid Rusty a quick look to see him staring back, mouth open and brows lifted in startled happiness.

“Matthew. Oh, my goodness.”

The swell of affection in Matt’s chest was nothing new. Rusty close to him, happy and a little drunk, also happened on the regular. But tonight, his pulse kicked, and the look in Rusty’s eyes made him feel like he’d done something a little wild. He needed to breathe deeper around the feeling.

They stood together in silence on the coast of Maine with only the ocean for company, a million miles from home. The patio had emptied. Somebody inside was giving a toast. 

“Bryan,” he began with appropriate solemnity. _Fuck it_ , he thought with vigor. 

“Yes.” Rusty said it like an answer.

“Should we get out of here?”

Rusty hesitated, and the meaning of Matt’s question teetered back and forth in his eyes. They weren’t friends like that. But they weren’t _not_ friends like that. The time they’d spent together this summer had shifted a few things around.

To clarify his question, he dropped his gaze to Rusty’s mouth and bit his lip. 

Rusty exhaled a sound of surprise, the muscle in his arm jumping against Matt’s shoulder. “Holy fuck,” he said. 

“Holy fuck, yeah, or holy fuck, no?”

“Holy fuck, yeah. I think.” Bryan looked up at him. They still hadn’t moved from the railing. “Matt Murray, living dangerously.” 

His scrutiny was justified. Matt had a well-earned reputation and was in sole possession of the knowledge concerning Rusty’s beginner-bisexuality. At least at this venue.

Put that way, Matt almost turned himself down before Bryan could. 

“You gotta dance with me some more first,” Bryan said with a smile not quite as easy as his others. “Deal?” 

Matt pushed away from the railing. He’d never turn down a dance, even if it weren’t a condition for maybe fucking his teammate. “Deal.”

*

Dumo’s partner mark had come in at the base of his breastbone, right over his stomach—the tacos he’d made for his girl on the night he knew he loved her. He’d showed them to the whole team in the locker room the day after the mark came in. Hard-shell tacos he’d fried himself, in perfect detail just beneath his ribs like a tattoo. Only not. A mark from the universe. A sign that he’d found his heart’s great love. 

On the dancefloor that night, he ripped open his shirt to show everyone. Fucking tacos. 

Word was, his girl’s mark was raunchy as hell and no way was she sharing it with anyone but her husband. Still, she kissed the mark over his stomach, and everyone cheered—even Matt, who’d gotten tattoos this summer instead. 

*

“What do you think it is?” Rusty asked in the elevator up to his room. “I mean, like, some marks gotta be about sex, right? Sometimes that’s just when you know.” He leaned back against the handrail in the elevator and gripped it in both hands. 

“Yeah, it’s probably a dick,” Matt agreed. “The question is where it turned up on her.”

Bryan laughed. “Come on, Kayla doesn’t just love Dumo for his dick. The universe is more artistic than that.”

Matt shrugged. “I don’t know, man; we’ve both seen it.” His actual dick—not an artistic rendering—and, like hell, the universe was artistic.

The universe was random and cruel, and the marks that emerged were the proof. They came and went, even for married couples, for lifelong friends, or the closest siblings. Unless you were Sid and they never faded, his body covered in images from teammates and friends. Or you were Matt and you made your own because none ever came. 

If you were Matt, your dad died without a mark on him. No sign that he’d ever loved anyone, even his only kid.

If you were Matt, you knew it was all bullshit, and you knew what mattered without the universe needing to draw it on your skin.

Bryan’s room was closer to the elevator, so they went there, but when the door shut behind them, and they hovered in the short entryway, Matt hesitated. Bryan watched him. He waited too, so still he might have been holding his breath. 

“What do you like?” Matt asked finally. “What do you want?”

The moment hung there a little longer, until Bryan blinked and cleared his throat. He twitched a shrug. “Fuck, I don’t know. I just want you to touch me. Wanted it for a while.” Nerves had leaked into his voice, and he cleared his throat again. 

That tremble—like a brief, private flash of Rusty’s underbelly—sent the pool of heat low in Matt’s gut flooding up to his face, and he grabbed for Bryan’s shirt quicker than he’d reached for anybody since… Well, it’d been a while.

Ducking down to see the buttons of Rusty’s dress shirt in the dim light, he breathed Rusty’s air but didn’t kiss him. The anticipation was even better than a kiss. Bryan’s hands clenched into fists at his sides.

“What do you like?” he asked in return. His old stutter warbled in his throat, and he breathed deep into his abdomen to calm it. “What do you want?”

Matt peeled the shirt off Rusty’s thick shoulders and got a good eyeful of his torso. His family marks peeked out from the insides of his arms, and Knuckles’ sat low on his side, broken and faded. It was the only team mark Bryan’d had since Matt had first played with him—some fourth line inside joke he had never gotten. 

Tommy was headed to Long Island, and it looked like Bryan had made that break. Matt didn’t want to stare, however curious he might be, so he reached for Bryan’s hands and brought them up to his sides instead. Bryan inhaled sharply as he gripped Matt’s waist. 

“I want this,” Matt answered.

Bryan nodded. Licked his lips. He looked up, a solid six inches’ height difference between them, then tipped back against the entryway wall, drawing Matt with him. Matt loomed over him, braced a hand on the wall by his head, and ducked down. Rusty’s beard prickled against his, so he rubbed his jaw against him like a cat, and traced the fingers of his other hand down Rusty’s stomach to the clasp of his suit pants. 

His belly was soft with his summer weight, and Matt pinched it before he could stop himself. Bryan huffed and dug his fingers between Matt’s ribs in retaliation.

“Hey, you know I like a little chub,” Matt said with a smile. Beneath his hand, Bryan flexed his abs, his core solid as a wall. Doubtless what he was demonstrating to Matt.

“Don’t call it chub,” he said.

“What should I call it, then? I wanna bite it.” Matt bent his knees and started to sink lower, started to drop, but Bryan stopped him with a hand on his jaw and caught him for that first kiss of the night. Matt shut his eyes at the last possible moment, just before that buzz of contact. Bristly mouth and champagne tongue. An exhale turned to a moan in Bryan’s throat, and that wild feeling expanded in Matt’s chest. He shoved gently, though Bryan was already flush against the wall, and Bryan made a rough sound, arching his hips against Matt’s thigh. 

“I wanna fucking _ride_ you,” he said, and Matt had never heard him sound like that before. All Bryan’s swagger, every bit of confidence he projected, were pale imitations of the desire in his voice. He knew exactly what he wanted.

“Okay, yeah,” he managed, just as Bryan snagged Matt’s hand and pulled him to the bed.

“Come on,” Bryan said, and after a scramble, tugging each other’s pants and underwear off, Bryan pushed him onto his back. He swung his leg over Matt’s thighs, and said, “Yippee-ki-yay.” And immediately burst into laughter.

“Oh my god.” Matt reached for Rusty’s waist, gripped the soft parts of him, and craned up for a kiss as Rusty leaned down to smother his own laughing. 

“Forget I just said that,” he said against Matt’s lips.

Matt nodded, humoring him. “Okay, buddy.”

“I’ve actually got lube,” Bryan said. “In the bathroom. I mean, it’s cheap lotion, but—”

“Sure, okay,” Matt said as Bryan climbed back off him. They weren’t going all the way in a hotel room at Dumo’s wedding with cheap lotion for lube, but dry handjobs didn’t sound awesome either. Bryan returned with it, squinting at the label as he knelt up on the edge of the bed.

Matt reached for his knee to swing him back into his lap. “I’m sure it’s fine,” he said. “Get on me.” 

“Whoa, all right, cowboy.” Bryan popped the cap on the lotion but then hesitated, staring down at Matt’s dick.

“I know this isn’t your first time with a guy,” Matt said, lowering his voice.

“No, yeah. Right.” Bryan hadn’t blinked in about a minute. “I’m just… It’s crazy we’re doing this, right? It’s not weird that I’m a little freaked out—I mean, this is legit crazy.” 

Matt tensed, but Bryan finally looked up and grinned. “Crazy in an awesome way, though. I can’t believe we didn’t do this before. Like when we won the Cup. Twice. That would’ve been a good time.”

“Yeah,” Matt answered, blankly. 

What the fuck was he thinking messing around with his best friend on the team? Jesus, he was an idiot. But fuck if he was about to say that to Bryan right now. Not with his hand on Matt’s stomach, tracing down to circle around his dick, a look on his face like he couldn’t believe his luck. And yeah, fuck it. Matt was a lucky bastard too. “Giddy up,” he said. 

Bryan laughed and bent forward again to kiss him, craning his neck to reach and still keep his hand on Matt’s dick. “You’re really long, you know that?” he muttered.

“Come up here, then,” Matt invited with a twitch of his chin. He gathered Rusty closer and rubbed his hands down to grab the meat of his ass, and it didn’t matter that Rusty had to let go of his dick. When he was settled against Matt’s front, Matt’s cock fit snugly against his ass. Rocking his hips up, he slid right between his cheeks. 

“Fuck, that’s perfect,” Bryan grunted and dropped his head against Matt’s shoulder. He rubbed off against Matt’s lower belly, and Matt maybe lost his mind a little. He clutched at Bryan’s body—his ass, his waist, his thighs—and fucked up against him in a reckless rhythm. It was so different from what he did with the other guys he messed around with, especially with Vic. Bryan made short, happy sounds against his throat and kissed them into his mouth, and Matt could only think of getting him off. Making him come, making him laugh, making him stupid-happy. 

He imagined Bryan holding onto him and shaking through his orgasm, coming all across Matt’s stomach, and cursed aloud. 

“Fuck, I’m close.” 

Pressing his arm flat across Matt’s chest, Bryan leaned up to look at him, red-faced and heavy-eyed. “Do it, babe. I’m right behind you.”

Matt groaned, clenched his fingers tight against Bryan’s ass, and jackrabbited his hips between his cheeks, friction, cheap lube, and Bryan’s open mouth pushing him over. He wrapped his arms tight around Bryan’s waist and leaned up to nip at his jaw as the motion of Bryan’s hips slowed and deepened. He imagined being inside Bryan for real, Bryan grinding down on him, and another pulse of pleasure rung itself from his balls. He was making a fucking mess of Bryan’s back.

He made a desperate sound, and Bryan nodded like he understood and agreed. He combed his fingers through Matt’s hair and, without another word, came all over Matt’s stomach. It was a warm, wet spill between them, and when Bryan finally went boneless on top of him, he breathed like he’d just been double-shifted.

The sound of their breath filled the hotel room for a long moment until Bryan exhaled a laugh against Matt’s throat and slid off him to one side. He kept his arm and leg hooked across Matt’s front and gently bit his shoulder. 

“Well, I’m a jizz sandwich right now. That’s a first.”

“Sorry,” Matt answered by reflex, but when he reached for the tissues, Bryan snagged his arm and pinned it to the bed. 

“It’s cool. Just wait a second.” He was staring at the side of Matt’s face; Matt could feel it.

He had a teammate’s spunk dripping along the tracks of his ribs, but Matt wasn’t a coward, so he turned to him. Bryan looked back with just as much of himself and his feelings in his face as Matt expected. 

“Your bed is gonna be trashed if we don’t clean up,” Matt said, and softened his words with a kiss. Bryan touched his cheek with sticky fingers. 

“Do you wanna shower with me?”

Matt nodded, and though he’d closed his eyes, he felt Bryan smile into another kiss.

*

Everyone on the team of course knew Matt had no marks, because everyone on the team saw each other naked nine days out of ten. The appearance of a soul mark was always cause for celebration. If one faded, the guys offered manful back slaps and bro-hugs of sympathy. They could hide nothing from each other, so they didn’t try. 

All except Matt. Matt had nothing to hide but nothing to show either. He was blank.

He used to wonder if he loved differently. Or wrong. Or less. For a period after his parents’ divorce, he was ashamed of his naked skin—certain it was a brand of a different sort. Genetics or the bad blood of a broken home; either way, he was missing something vital. Some people never got partner marks or family marks or amity marks, but almost everyone had at least one of the three. _Something_ to show for the relationships they built.

High school convinced him his empty skin was the best mistake the universe could have made. It was, in fact, a gift. He was a blank page. An empty wall. Not a soul could look at him and know his heart. His bare skin kept him safe from assholes in locker rooms, looking to torment each other over the evidence on their skin. Even better, he was safe from the guys he crushed on from his teams. He’d never hidden his sexuality, but there was a huge difference between the guys knowing he was gay and seeing their marks on his skin. 

Once he’d turned pro and begun the long slog to the big league, well. Who could say what were the Murray genes and what was habit? His goaltending coach had asked him once down in Wilkes if he wanted to “talk to someone” about any of it—balancing hockey and his private life and maybe even integrating them a little. Matt had declined. He didn’t owe his teammates access to himself when they’d always been off limits to him.

After this year—his dad, his shitty postseason, his self-imposed isolation—Matt didn’t…he didn’t wish for the marks to prove his love for his team. To prove his commitment to his city. He knew what he felt. The shorthand of a team mark would have done the job nicely, though. Talking about his feelings had never gotten Matt where he wanted to go.

So, the tattoos were for himself, but they weren’t just for him. After their shower, Rusty lay beside him and traced his fingers down the inside of his arm, over the stark new ink. Matt followed their path with his eyes and did not let the question of whether this had been a mistake intrude. 

“They’re really great,” Bryan said quietly, head pillowed on his arm, his knees nudged up against Matt’s. 

“Thanks,” Matt answered after a moment, unsure if Bryan expected an explanation for them. Tattoos carried a stigma— _faker_ —and he really didn’t want to see that in Bryan’s eyes if he looked. 

Bryan rubbed his thumb over the 16 and 17 on Matt’s fingers. The tattoos were for him, but they were for his dad, too. And for his team. For his city. He should tell Bryan that. Now would be a good time to tell him. But his mouth wouldn’t open, and the moment passed. 

“I was, uh. Pretty surprised when you—” Bryan cut himself off and glanced at Matt before refocusing on Matt’s hand. His mouth twitched in a smile. 

“When I, what?”

“When you picked me up at the reception.” He gave a nervous laugh. “I was really surprised.”

“Yeah?” 

“Well, I’m not exactly… I didn’t think I was your type.” 

Matt shrugged and exhaled a short laugh, relaxing. “Oh. I don’t really know what my type is, I guess.”

He didn’t need to look over at Rusty to see his epic side-eye—it was all through his voice. “Seriously?”

“Okay, I have _a_ type. But someone I’m really into?” He shrugged again.

He liked guys who wanted something short and wild—nothing like their marriages, or their old lives. Rich and divorced and impulsive; that was _a_ type he liked. Anything to get his mind off his team for a night or a weekend. Off the guys who were everything to him and yet nowhere _on_ him. With Vic at least, there were no illusions and no expectations of anything else. That they’d lasted almost five months was—

“That’s okay,” Bryan said quietly.

Matt took a sharp breath, having lost the thread of the conversation. “What is?”

“To not know your type. Or not have one. I don’t know if I do, either.”

And, yeah. If the things Bryan had told Matt in the middle of the night on his boat this summer were anything to go by, neither of them had particularly discerning taste. He didn’t know if that made what they’d just done reasonably smart or incredibly stupid. 

Bryan kissed him before either of them could say anything else on the subject—slow, scratchy, sleepy kisses that zoned Matt out and pushed whatever bullshit he could worry about right then into the background. He squeezed Rusty’s waist and felt him smile.

“I changed my mind,” Bryan murmured against his lips. “You can call it ‘chub.’ You can call it whatever you want as long as you like it.”

“Oh, I like it.” He pulled Bryan back on top of him and inhaled the hint of hotel soap by his ear. Any padding he had now would all be gone by February or March, and Matt wanted to touch him then, too, to feel him whittled down to raw muscle and tenacity. A teammate he could touch like this. Fuck, he wanted it.

Yeah, so, he had another type. And this one got him nothing but trouble.

When he traced his fingers down Bryan’s back, Bryan shivered hard. “Yeah, do that.” So Matt did—between Bryan’s shoulder blades and down the groove of his spine, back and forth between the divots of his hip bones, and right down to the dip between his ass cheeks where he’d fucked, over to Bryan’s sides where Bryan breathed a laugh and twitched on top of him. 

Bryan’s weight kept him still and held him down in a way that had him tumbling toward sleep within minutes, and with Bryan’s heartbeat thudding steadily against his ribs, Matt dropped under.

*

He awoke just as the sky was turning gray with morning, which meant that, in August, it was way too early to be up. But he had to piss, and his whole front was sweaty where Bryan still slept on him. 

Extracting himself from the bed, he managed not to wake Bryan, but the blankets had pulled down, baring his whole back. 

His whole back, which, in the pale light from around the curtain edges, had something on it. Something that had absolutely not been there a few hours before. Crossing the room, Matt pulled the curtain further open, careless of his nudity. He returned to the bed, pulse kicking up into his ears, as he squinted at Bryan’s skin and realized what he was looking at. 

It was a constellation. Pegasus. But not just the stars, like new moles across his back—there were lines connecting them, and around those, an artistic rendering of a winged horse. Upside-down like it’d been when they saw it on Matt’s boat this summer, through an app on his phone. 

Matt had run his fingers over that skin only a few hours ago, and it had been empty. But here it was—a mark from the universe. A mark _of_ the fucking universe itself. The summer stars from Matt’s boat.

His whole body flushing hot, he ran to the bathroom, slapped on the switch, and shut the door. _Not again. Not here. Not Rusty, please._

In the harsh glare of the overhead light, he examined himself with brief and terrible hope, twisting around to see his back in the mirror. It was dotted with plenty of moles, but naked as ever, and when he checked the rest of himself, he found the same empty skin. Except for the ink he’d put there this summer. 

Matt wet his lips and rested both hands on the sink countertop. He shut his eyes and breathed through his nose, his throat tightening. He managed to swallow around the lump, but then his eyes began to burn.

“Fuck,” he said under his breath. “Fucking fuck.” This was what he got for messing around with teammates. This was why he never did it. _Why_ had he done it this time? Was he really that fucked up over Vic leaving? Was he that desperate?

He shook his head, not needing an answer to that question, opened his eyes again, and hesitated only a moment longer. He bit the inside of his lip hard enough to pinch. There was no point staying. Not now. Not for this particular morning after.

Bryan slept like the dead—a skill he’d picked up from years on team buses—and he didn’t stir as Matt collected his clothes and pulled them on in the short hallway by the door. He didn’t stir when Matt grabbed his shoes and left the room, careful not to let the noisy bolt catch on his way out—a skill Matt had picked up from years of casual hookups. 

He stumbled on his way back to his room, but, catching himself against the wall, Matt blamed it on the beginnings of a hangover.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In honor of Rusty's hat trick on this day, have two chapters :)

_June 2018_

The boat rocked gently underneath them, and overhead, the stars seemed to zoom toward Matt through space and time, the sky more than three-dimensional above them. Or maybe he was hurtling through space and time toward them.

Or maybe he was really high. 

Whatever the explanation, Rusty seemed to feel it too. “God, the stars out here are incredible. It’s so dark; I feel like I can see the whole…the whole universe.”

“Right?” Matt smiled up at the view from the cushioned bow of his new boat and had to close his eyes against the overwhelming sense that he was rising into the sky. Intellectually he knew they were safely docked at his house, but he could swear the galaxy was calling him home.

“You okay?” Rusty asked, voice right by his hear, so close Matt could almost feel the texture of it.

“Yeah,” he answered, though his feelings were right there at the surface like they had been from the moment the season ended. Rusty was here, so at least they were good feelings. “I’m really good. How are you?”

Rusty laughed. “Not as good as you, looks like.”

Matt opened his eyes and turned his head just enough to see Rusty sprawled next to him. “Really? Do you want another hit?” The joint had gone out in the ashtray between them, but he could relight it.

“No, I’m all set. I like knowing where my body parts are.”

“Yeah,” Matt agreed. “Well, just let me know if you need anything. I’ll get it for you.”

It was easy to be generous with Rusty and always had been. Or—it had the moment Matt understood they weren’t competing for a single thing and were therefore uncomplicated and safe. 

“Anything, huh?” Bryan asked.

“Yeah, chips, popcorn, water, beer, a sweatshirt.” It was all down below; he just had to get up. Which he would be able to do. The thought of popcorn was almost enough on its own.

“I’m good with all that stuff. Thanks, buddy. But, uh. What about… Do you think I could tell you something?” 

“Sure, man,” Matt answered, probably too quickly. “I like when you tell me things.” When Rusty told him things, Matt felt like a dry sponge—or he realized he was a dry sponge the moment Rusty shared a secret and suddenly he wasn’t so unbending and brittle anymore.

“Cool. Well…” Rusty laughed again, more stiffly this time. “I’ve got a doozy. I, uh. You know I was thinking about telling my brother I was maybe into guys a little more than I thought. Like, more than just team.”

“Yeah, I know.” Matt was the first person Rusty had told—way back when they’d made it to the big team and knew they weren’t going down again. He’d come to Matt, of course, because Matt was out and had never been in. 

Rusty and Knuckles had been joined at the hip from the beginning, but Bryan had confessed to Matt that he wanted more than just team with Tom. The universe had stamped a declaration of love on their skin, but Bryan was still terrified to tell him because… Well because team marks were _special_ , and sex was for committed partner bonds only and would fuck with team dynamics and blah, blah.

Matt knew a thing or two about messy feelings for teammates, but since those feelings had never shown up on his skin, he’d never had to explain them to anyone. Or—well. He probably should have explained them, but he hadn’t. Hearing about Rusty’s soothed his rough edges in a way he should definitely share. With Rusty. 

The silence that had fallen between them finally registered, and Matt forced himself to pay closer attention. Blinking a few times, the stars looked normal again and he settled back into his body, where he needed to be to handle this. He shoved up to one elbow. “So did you tell him? How did it go?”

Rusty shrugged. “I don’t know. Okay, I think? Like, he wasn’t mad or anything, but I’m not sure he believed me.”

“Why do you think that?” Matt asked. 

“Because he asked if I’d ever dated a guy, and when I said ‘not really…’”

“He asked how you knew if you’d never tried it.”

“Right.” Rusty exhaled sharply. “I didn’t tell him I’d sucked plenty of dick and liked it. Didn’t seem like the right moment. He didn’t—he didn’t seem to want to hear it.”

Matt frowned, his unsteady emotions pushing at him and prodding him to do something. Reach out. Rusty needed him now, and it felt really good to be needed. 

“Are you still glad he knows?”

Rusty shrugged again, then shook his head. “I don’t know. He’s not gonna tell Mom and Dad, or anything. He’s probably not gonna tell anyone. And I think I was hoping he would. Like he could spread the word to the people who’d want to know. But I don’t think he will.”

Matt had never had an older brother of his own, but from what he knew of them, Matt Rust was falling down on the job and had been for a few years now. Probably since his little brother had won a Stanley Cup and an NHL contract.

Jealousy was hell. Rusty still had his big brother’s hockey number on the inside of his arm, though. As dark and strong a family mark as there ever was—evidence of Bryan’s faith or the universe’s indifference, Matt would never know for sure.

“I’m sorry.”

Rusty nodded. “Me too. I don’t know; maybe it’s a sign I shouldn’t tell anyone else. It’s not important enough, or whatever. I’ve got the team. I’ve got good friends. It’s not like I—it’s not like people have to know.”

Matt bit his cheek to keep from disagreeing, to keep from assuring Rusty everyone loved him for exactly who he was and should be glad to know this about him. 

Matt didn’t like to be a hypocrite, though. He’d bottled up so much for so long, he didn’t even know how to let it out. How could he tell Rusty to be himself and be proud when he could hardly string two words together to express how he felt? 

“Do you want to see something cool?” he asked instead.

In the dark, Rusty’s unsteadiness vibrated along every line of his body. But he buttoned his shit up like a champ and nodded. “Sure, yeah.”

Matt slid his phone out of his pocket. “My buddy back home showed me this. It’s really fucking cool.” Opening the app, he held it over them and waited for it to finish loading. 

“What is it?” Rusty asked, scooting closer along the bow to press right against Matt’s shoulder. “Whoa, are those constellations? Is that a planet?”

Matt smiled and moved the phone to bring other stars into view. “Yeah, it sees the stars and tells you what constellations and planets you’re looking at. It even plays, like, space music if you’re in the mood.”

“When am I not in the mood?” Rusty murmured. He put his arm up and cupped his hand behind Matt’s to angle the phone a little better. “This is so cool. I like the drawings around the stars so it’s easier to tell what the shapes are.”

“It’ll show you stars that are beyond the horizon, too. Like ones that haven’t come up yet. See?” He moved the phone to show him a half-risen constellation. “Pegasus.”

“Pegasus,” Rusty repeated softly. “I’ve never looked at that one before. It’s upside-down.”

“I guess, yeah, it is.” 

Rusty’s head tipped against Matt’s, and Matt pressed firmly back.

“Hey, I wonder if we could see the stars on the other side of the planet from here.”

“We could try it.” Matt took the phone from Rusty’s grip and shifted over onto his stomach. With a grunt, Rusty followed, though he didn’t flip the whole way over. Instead, he hooked one arm across Matt’s lower back and leaned his cheek against Matt’s shoulder, half draped over him. It was so typical of how he was around the people he loved, Matt forgot all about the stars he was supposed to be seeing and closed his eyes.

“Look, there they are, holy shit. The stars in Australia. Or China? That’s so cool.” 

Matt opened his eyes, but he still didn’t look at the phone. It was instinct that turned him in toward Rusty’s warmth. It was a choice to kiss him. They were so close already, the angle was awkward, but Matt leaned into it for another second—bristly and soft and cool from the night air—before pulling away.

Bryan’s eyes were closed, and he was smiling. “Puts things in perspective a little, doesn’t it,” he said.

“What does?” Matt asked, voice rough.

“There’s stars on the on the other side of the planet that millions of other people are looking at right now. And, uh.” His gaze dropped to Matt’s mouth. “That helped too.”

Matt didn’t quite know what to say next, so he said nothing, but the silence that fell was easy. And not really silence at all—water lapped against the sides of the boat, peepers made a racket in the woods along the shore, and Bryan breathed steadily beside him. 

It gave Matt the space to figure out what he wanted Bryan to know. “It’s okay to be pissed or hurt, man. It’s okay to want to be known by the people you love. You don’t need perspective on that.” 

Rusty flipped onto his back again, but he stayed so close, the easiest thing would have been for Matt to pull him in just a little tighter and fall asleep on him. 

Rusty said quietly, “You know me,” and his words sent a charge up Matt’s spine out to his fingers. “Which feels pretty awesome right now.”

“Good,” Matt said, flustered. Rusty looked up at him, probably waiting for Matt to say it back to him. _You know me, too._ But Matt was too afraid it’d be a lie to try saying it out loud. What effort had he really made to allow Rusty to know him? Or any of the guys, really, save one?

This time, the silence pulled tight and tense between them, until Rusty blinked and slid away from him, sitting up. “Hey, popcorn sounds really good, actually. And a drink.” He slid off the bow cushions. “My mouth is like a fucking desert right now.” 

When he’d gone below, Matt blew out a breath and rolled over into the warm space he had occupied. He rubbed a hand up and down his breastbone and bit the inside of his lip. “Fuck,” he muttered to no one.


	3. Chapter 3

_March 2017_

“Oh shit, Flower, that’s a new one! Congrats, man!”

“That’s a beauty. Nice spot, too.”

Shrugging into his shirt after morning skate, Matt heard the commotion from Colesy and Cully, but it was Flower’s strange, choked laugh that sent a jolt through him. Matt yanked the t-shirt collar down over his head and spun around to see Flower with a towel around his waist and his big hand spread across the front of his right shoulder and collarbone. Ordinarily, Matt had to remind himself not to stare at Flower’s abs, but today, his gaze stuck on Marc’s hand.

“Whose is it?” Dumo asked without hesitance, not picking up in the slightest on Flower’s rigid posture or expression. Flower’s eyes lifted and locked with Matt’s, and his fingers flexed against his shoulder. There was no point hiding what was under there. The marks might be private and personal to most people, but to a bunch of naked guys in a locker room, they were the best kind of news and gossip. 

Flower didn’t look away from him as he lowered his hand to reveal the new mark. 

“It’s gotta be that post-deadline high,” Colesy said with a laugh and slapped Flower on the back before heading to his locker. They did tend to appear after heightened periods of emotion, and this year’s trade deadline was a doozy for Flower.

Out of habit, Matt found his other visible marks first—Tanger’s, Sid’s, Vero’s and the girls’—before finally looking at his shoulder. 

The mark was a familiar set of headphones with a pair of sunglasses folded up inside. 

Matt never came to work without them.

“Those are yours, right Murr?” Guentz asked.

The whole room went quiet, as the truth of it sank in. Guentz glanced around, eyes wide, and Matt was just glad he’d gotten all his clothes on first.

Not that it mattered. Everybody knew he had nothing on his skin. 

Flower’s voice broke the heavy silence. “Can I talk to you for a minute?” he said, and Matt yanked his gaze up from the mark on Flower’s shoulder. _His_ mark.

“Yeah,” he croaked, stomach flipping over with some unholy combination of hope and dread.

Nobody cheered for them. Not like when Hags and Phil found each other’s marks after the Cup win last year. Not like when Tanger spotted his on Dumo’s hip, swatted him right over the spot, and cheered along with the whole room finding his own.

Nobody knew what to say because Matt had none, and even if somehow, miraculously this time was different, Matt had his clothes on, and nobody was about to make him strip. Nobody knew what to say because Matt was gay. And a team mark wouldn’t be _just_ a team mark to him. They’d never say it, but Matt had seen it in enough of their faces. He’d seen it since he was fourteen years old.

So he waited by the exit while Flower yanked on his jeans and a clean shirt to cover his shoulder. Matt cast his eyes around the room to distract himself and found Sid watching him. 

Matt had been starstruck from the beginning, but he’d never envied Sid. Not once. The Cyrillic _K_ right over his heart—Geno’s mark—stood out more than Matt remembered. A stark brand that labeled him _loved and known_. Matt wondered what it must feel like to be so loved that teammates from Junior still marked your skin. Was it what Sid felt for them or what they felt for him that kept the marks there for so long?

What was so special about Sid, aside from the obvious? Did he just put that much more effort into his relationships, the same as his hockey? Was Matt just lazy and distant and—

A hand at his elbow startled him, and he tried to yank his arm free, but Flower gripped tighter and pulled him out of the locker room. He didn’t speak until they were out in the hall, when Matt tried to slow this down. “Come on, let’s go,” Flower said and led him to an empty exam room. He shut the door behind them and finally looked Matt in the eye. 

“I’m sorry, Matty,” he said, and Matt’s heart cracked right down the middle.

“What are you sorry for?”

“You didn’t ask for this, and neither did I.” Flower ran a hand through his shower-wet hair—something Matt had wanted to do for ages. He’d touched it before, but he’d never dug his fingers in and…

“How do you know?” Matt asked, trying not to sound as desperate as he felt. 

“Because you—” Flower gestured at him. “You don’t go for this shit. It’s not you. And I don’t—” He cut himself off, shifty and agitated. Making excuses.

“You don’t, what?” Matt kept his voice low and tight. 

“I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing,” Flower said in a rush. “I’m a fucking mess.” He cast a quick look at Matt, and his eyes were accusing. Matt was part of the mess, they said. Flower rubbed at his shoulder, and Matt couldn’t help himself.

“Can I see it again? Please?” It’d been so long since he’d seen himself on someone else. Evidence that he could be loved. 

Marc regarded him shrewdly. “Only if you show me, too. I want to see.”

“See what?” Matt asked blankly, like an idiot.

“I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.” Which was when Flower reached for the hem of Matt’s t-shirt and tugged it up to reveal his stomach. “Let me see you,” he said quietly.

And Matt went from zero to sixty in the time it took Flower to yank the shirt off over his head. 

Flower took off his own too before Matt could do more than stare. His breath and pulse rushed in his ears. Flower had Matt’s mark on his skin. It was still there. Marc loved him. The universe wanted them both to know—Marc-Andre loved him. 

Flower reached for him again, his big hands gripping hard, moving him, turning him. He was looking for evidence on Matt’s skin to match his own. Something unique to them, to Matt’s special understanding of him. He wasn’t going to find it.

“I’m sorry,” Matt blurted, echoing Flower in a way he hated. “I’ve never had them, ever. But it doesn’t mean I don’t love you back. Fuck, you know I do. I _am_ into this—I do go for this shit.” His heart was about to slam its way out of his ribs.

Flower let out that strange, choked laugh again. “You love me,” he said. “You love me so much you take my city and send me to the fucking desert.”

Matt stepped back by reflex, and Flower shook his head. “I’m staying this year so they can give me to fucking Vegas, and now I’ve got you on my skin. It’s fucking perfect.”

Matt grit his teeth against Flower’s unfair and perfectly justified anger. “I’m there because you love me,” he said. The universe had recognized it and made it visible. “And I love—”

“Prove it,” Marc bit out. “I need to see it, Matty.”

Matt hesitated for the length of a breath. The wild look in Marc’s eyes would get them both hurt. He was married with two little kids at home and nothing to gain from fucking around with a teammate. Matt grabbed him and yanked him into a hard kiss anyway. 

Matt wasn’t just another teammate, and this wasn’t just another team mark. Flower knew it, and fuck if Matt was about to let that slip through his fingers.

Marc made a surprised sound into his mouth and pushed him back until he came up against the counter. Then he angled the kiss deeper and pressed until the edge dug sharply into Matt’s back. It didn’t really hurt, though. It couldn’t with so much skin touching, chest-to-chest, belly-to-belly. Flower clutched at his jaw and his side and kissed the breath out of him. Or he did until Matt’s dick rubbed against his thigh. He’d been half-hard since Flower had grabbed his elbow. 

At that touch, he tried to push Matt away, but since Matt was already bent backward over the counter, Flower could only shove himself away. Which he did, with impressive speed. He wiped his mouth.

“We can’t do this,” he said. 

Matt nodded. He knew that.

“I can’t do this with you.” 

Matt knew, but apparently, Marc needed to rephrase and repeat. “I know,” Matt croaked. His lips were still humming from the kiss, from Marc’s stubble.

Flower bent down and snatched his shirt from the floor. He yanked it on like someone was about to burst in on them. “You can’t tell anybody.” He shot Matt a miserable look, and a strange satisfaction heated Matt’s body. Nobody saw Flower like this—pinched and unhappy and freaked out. Flower didn’t _let_ anyone see him like this. He was in hell, but he’d let Matt in with him, and Matt would hold onto that for as long as memory would let him.

“About Vegas or that I kissed you?” he asked, just to make Marc say it himself.

“Either one. Both. You have a…you have a boyfriend, right?” He said it like a way out, then shook his head. “This is just a teammate mark anyway.”

Matt nodded because he was expected to. And yeah. He and Theo had been fucking for over a month. Theo looked, spoke, and felt nothing like Marc-Andre, and that was 98% the point of him. That was the point of most of them. 

But this was not _just a teammate mark_. 

Flower’s expression was so magnetic in its pain, though, Matt couldn’t bring himself to say any of that out loud. Flower rubbed the mark on his shoulder through his shirt, and Matt would very likely never have this chance again. To just look and know.

“Wait,” he said quickly as Flower turned to leave. “Please wait.”

Crossing the exam room in two strides, he reached for the collar of Marc’s shirt and carefully tugged it down. It was soft and stretched in his grip, and Flower didn’t push him away again. He braced one hand on the doorknob and held very still as Matt looked carefully at what he could see of the mark, framed by the shirt collar. 

The detail was perfect—from the worn foam cushions of the headphones to the crooked bow of his sunglasses from too many naps on airplanes with his head tilted against his pillow. It was instinct that pressed his lips to the mark, and beneath his mouth, he felt Marc’s chest rise on a sharp inhale. 

Whatever happened after, however ugly things might get as they ramped up to Marc’s last playoffs with the team, this was real. The universe had declared it so. Despite Matt’s personal shortcomings.

Marc’s hand came to rest heavily on the back of Matt’s head. “I’m sorry,” he said quietly.

Matt couldn’t bear to see the sorrow he heard in Marc’s voice, so he rested his brow against Marc’s shoulder. “Please don’t be,” he answered. 

Marc-Andre huffed. “Just like that, huh? Because you say.”

“Why not?”

Marc squeezed the back of his neck and tugged gently at his hair until he straightened. “Okay, Matty. I won’t be sorry.” The latch clicked as Marc opened the door behind them and let his hand fall away from Matt’s neck. Reluctantly Matt let go of Marc’s shirt collar and followed him outside. 

They returned to a nearly empty locker room, where Tanger waited next to Flower’s open duffle bag, dressed and ready. Standing guard. Ready to send Matt on his way, if the wariness in his eyes was any indication. What reason did Tanger, or any of the guys, have to be happy for them, anyway? How unfortunate that Flower’s heart and Matt and the universe had conspired like this. To put Flower through this.

_This isn’t my fault_ , Matt wanted to say, but where was his proof? 

It came when he’d shouldered his own bag and headed for the exit, a lump of emotion wedged into his throat, and found Rusty waiting in the hallway just outside. 

“Oh, is Tom still here?” Matt asked automatically, looking back over his shoulder. 

“No, man, I was waiting for you.” Rusty pushed away from the wall and bumped his shoulder into Matt’s arm. “You okay?”

His eyes burned, but they stayed basically dry. “Uh. Yeah, I’m fine. Thanks.” His voice stuck a little, so he cleared his throat. Rusty and he were pretty tight, but that was almost all down to Rusty and the baby-bi steps he’d confessed taking to Matt last year. And the fact that he was Rusty. 

“You sure? Tanger didn’t bite you, or anything? That looked intense.”

Matt exhaled a laugh that cleared some of the tightness in his chest. He had to blink a few times to clear his eyes. “It was,” he admitted. And Tanger had nothing to do with it.

“I wanted to say…” Rusty shot him a quick look, too quick for Matt to catch his expression. “I wanted to say I think this is really great for you and Flower, and I don’t understand why nobody, like. Told you that in there. Big fucking deal, you’ve got no marks. So you’ve got no feelings, either? It’s bullshit. Sid’s our captain.” He lowered his voice as they walked toward the garage. “He needed to fucking tell you that back there. Or somebody did. Sorry I didn’t, buddy.”

Matt shrugged, though there wasn’t much point to playing it cool. “Thanks. But Flower’s their guy, and this is all pretty fucked for him, so. I get it.”

“ _No._ Not just him.” Rusty shook his head and shoved open the heavy outside door with more force than necessary. “Flower loves you, and everybody knows you’re crazy about him, and—”

“And he’s married and _straight_ and pissed he’s my backup and fucking leaving after this season. So it’s fucked, Rusty. It’s not something to celebrate.” Matt sniffed noisily and rubbed a hand under his nose. The parking garage in March was a wind tunnel, and apparently everyone knew about his pathetic crush on Flower.

And he felt ten times better having spilled all that shit into the open. 

Rusty hugged his arms tightly across his chest, dressed only in a hoodie and sweats because he’d forgotten his coat again. “Nobody on this team is straight,” he grumbled. “They’re all at least half in love with Sid, and they’re lying if they deny it.”

Matt huffed a laugh. He could safely say he didn’t have that pathetic crush, at least.

“But teammate bonds aren’t sexual or romantic because that fucks with the whole dynamic,” he said, paraphrasing the rules they all knew. “So nobody wants my mark on them because they think I want to fuck them.”

“So what if you do?” Rusty snapped. “Jesus H., what’s the big deal?” He snorted an ugly laugh, and Matt almost asked how things were with Tom. But no-news probably meant no news. Tom was clinging to that spot on the fourth line, and no way was he risking it. 

The rest of the world had begun to blur distinctions when it came to partner and amity marks. And with those blurred distinctions came new names for relationships Matt had considerable interest in exploring. But teammates were still a category unto themselves, and hockey was its own animal.

“Thanks,” he said again. “For waiting for me and for…”

“Taking you out to lunch?” Rusty finished quickly. His mouth twisted in a bittersweet smile. “You bet, buddy. The universe recognized something beautiful today, so you should at least get a sandwich out of it.”

“How ‘bout Thai?”

“You should at least get Thai food out of it.”

Rusty followed Matt to his car, and Matt started it right up to get the heat going for him.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, friends, but my last chapter became 9k, so I'm breaking it up into two.

_September 2018_

Matt’s thumb hovered over his phone for another second before he exhaled sharply and posted the pic to his Instagram—he and Beckham on the deck chaise, with Beckham between his knees, Eric over by the grill poking at their burgers. Or Eric from the neck down over by the grill. It was early for faces on the internet. In all likelihood, he and Eric wouldn’t make it to the face-in-photos phase.

The pic was timestamped evidence of a blown-off cookout at Sid’s for the vets getting back to town. Matt was a vet now. He’d received an invite in a group chat he should feel really great belonging to. Cully would be there, because Cully was back this year, which was a mind-trip all its own. 

Matt wouldn’t blow off the whole night, because that would be rude, and Matt was going to be better this year. He’d go after he and Eric ate. He might even bring Eric with him. Families were invited. Eric should maybe meet the team before his face showed up on Matt’s Insta. Because Matt was going to be better about lots of things this year.

He should bring Eric to meet the team because Rusty was in that group chat, too, and Rusty had a month-old mark on his back that Matt was doing his best to get rid of for him.

*

But after dinner on his deck, a pit of nerves claimed the burger Matt had just eaten and turned his stomach into a painful knot. He’d never introduced a guy he was dating to the team before. He kept his personal life to himself because that’s what he’d been trained to do. Or, he kept it between himself and his Insta followers. They were safer. He could block the homophobes, and everyone loved his dogs.

Standing at his sink with his and Eric’s plates in hand, Matt stared out into his backyard, but his mind was on Sid’s deck—his teammates, their wives and kids spilling out into the yard. And there Matt would be, with this guy he hardly knew, whose best qualities included big hands and a nice dick. 

They’d met on tinder, of course, just as Matt was getting back to town. They knew each other’s preferences because that was the whole point. So when Eric came up behind him and took the plates from Matt’s hand, they both had every reason to believe Matt would be into the way Eric turned him— _moved_ him where he wanted—and pressed him back against the counter. 

Matt had told him he liked it the first time they’d fucked, liked the way the edge dug into his lower back, the sharp pressure, the helplessness of the position. 

Since his mark had turned up on Flower’s shoulder two seasons ago, Matt’s preference for guys who weren’t-Flower had swung wildly from the ones who were nothing like him to the ones who could be him if he closed his eyes tight enough. Making out once with your hero/crush could do that to a guy.

Eric could put him back in that exam room with his height, his hands, and the way he kissed. Not as well as Victor had, but Matt couldn’t afford to be picky after Dumo’s wedding.

Dumo’s wedding had done something to the sense-memory of Flower’s kiss. Blurred it. Pushed it into the background.

Rusty had done the pushing. And he’d done it before the wedding. Even before Matt had broken up with Vic, he’d thought a lot about that kiss on his boat—the sky huge overhead and the cool, careful press of lips and. He’d thought about Rusty’s honesty, his trust and belief in Matt. After that week with him, Matt had sworn to himself he would be the kind of teammate and friend his whole team could count on.

When Rusty had shown up on that balcony at the reception in August in his tailored suit pants and sweaty dress shirt, Flower and his kiss had been nowhere in his mind. 

Or maybe they were just in the past, where they belonged.

All of which was to say that Eric bending him backward against the kitchen sink didn’t do what it used to for him. Especially not when Matt’s palm slid against the edge of the sink as he braced and dumped him half into it. His hand landed against the two plates with a crash and knocked over a pint glass, which cracked and broke against the enamel of the sink. 

“Fuck,” he spat. “What the _fuck_.”

“Shit, did you cut yourself?” Eric asked. He reached for Matt’s greasy, ketchup-streaked hand, but Matt pushed him back with his other.

“No—get off.” He turned away sharply and switched the faucet on full-blast to wash it clean.

In his periphery, Eric took a step back, his hands raised. “All right. Jesus, take it easy. I thought you liked—”

“You should go,” Matt interrupted. “I’ve gotta get to Sid’s for a thing.” Thank fuck he hadn’t worked up the nerve to ask Eric to go with him. 

“What the hell, I thought—”

“You thought whatever, all right?” Matt couldn’t stand to turn around and look at him, to see what Eric might think of him. Of this. Matt had been in town a week—they definitely wouldn’t be making it to the faces-in-photos phase.

It was Matt’s responsibility to confront this, but right then the doorbell rang, and he made his escape. He snagged a dishtowel from the hook above his sink and brushed past Eric, drying his hand as he went. Not bothering to check who’d rung, he yanked the front door open.

His heart dropped to his feet. 

“There you are,” Rusty said, looking up at him from the doorstep. His smile was plastered on. “Where the hell have you been?”

Matt gripped the doorknob so hard his knuckles ached. “I’ve been here,” he answered. 

“Yeah, I saw that,” Bryan scoffed. He touched the outline of his phone in his jeans pocket. “Plenty of guys saw it.”

“I was just about to come over.”

“That doesn’t really answer my question, though.” His smile got more brittle with a tightening in the corners of his eyes. “Where have you been, Matt?”

Throat catching, he could think of nothing past the sound of his name from Bryan’s mouth. Not Murr, not Muzz. Not Matty.

“I—”

Eric pushed past him then, shrugging into his coat. Luckily, Rusty hadn’t parked him in. “Don’t call me, asshole,” he said on his way down the steps. 

Rusty watched him go, the fake smile sliding from his mouth, his eyes hard and hurt. 

“Don’t worry, I don’t call anybody,” Matt grumbled, mostly to himself. 

“No, you fucking don’t,” Rusty bit out, facing him again.

Matt stepped back, inviting him inside with a twitch of his chin. “I was trying to do you a favor. Trust me.” 

“What kind of favor is blowing me off for a month, after we—” Bryan cut himself off and shook his head. “After your—” He waited until Matt had shut the door. “After your mark showed up on my back.”

Matt licked the fronts of his teeth and pinched his mouth shut tight. This was the first they’d spoken since August. Rusty, somehow, looked more fantastic than he had at the wedding in tight jeans and a blue henley, holding his confusion and hurt out for Matt to fix. As if he could. 

“It’s worse than that,” Matt made himself say. “I saw it the morning after we had sex. That’s why I left. When you called me later, when you left a message about it—I already knew.”

Rusty blinked at him. “You knew?”

Matt nodded. 

“And you just left.” Matt nodded again, and Bryan huffed a short sound. He shook his head. “I didn’t find it until one of my buddies pointed it out at the fucking gym—why would you _leave_?”

“I think…I think there’s a pretty obvious answer to that, Bry.” His chest hurt as he said it.

But Bryan didn’t take the bait. “No, that’s not how it works. The marks appear together, always. It’s always mutual.”

A laugh burst from Matt’s mouth before he could swallow it. “Are you fucking with me right now?”

“What?” Bryan cast a glance around the room, maybe looking for an audience, some kind of witness to this. “No, why would I—”

“You know I’ve never had any. I’m not hiding yours just to be a dick. It’s nowhere, trust me.”

“I didn’t think it would be,” he said more carefully. Gently.

“So, you think I want you as much as you want me; I just don’t show it,” Matt bit out, trying and failing to mock the sincerity in Rusty’s delivery.

“Yes,” Bryan answered. And that was relief in his voice. “Only you do show it. You did. I was there.”

Matt had walked right into this. His body reeled at what had just come out of his mouth, ribs and lungs compressing around his heart, stealing his breath. Rusty’s eyes were pleading with him. Matt owed him this honesty.

“I... have nothing to show you,” he managed. “I’m sorry. That’s why I left.”

“Bullshit, you don’t.” Bryan reached for his wrist, pressed his thumb into Matt’s palm and flipped his hand over to show the underside of his arm, the tattoos he’d gotten this summer. “They’re right here, and even if—”

“You know that’s not the same thing,” Matt interrupted, snatching his hand away.

Bryan rolled his eyes and groaned. “Look, it doesn’t matter to me that you don’t have any marks. You should know that by now.”

“It matters to _me_ ,” he bit out. The words tumbled out like rocks between them, probably the heaviest and truest he’d ever spoken. “No matter what I—feel for you. I’ll never be able to do what you can do—I’ll always be less. And I can’t live with that.”

Bryan’s mouth dropped open as silence expanded between them. He drew a short breath, hesitated, and finally said, “You know it’s not a competition. Right?” For the first time since he’d arrived on Matt’s doorstep, he looked worried. He looked like he was finally getting it. 

So was Matt.

“Yeah. It is.” 

Bryan regarded him quietly for another long moment. Then he whistled and rocked backward on his heels. “Damn. And all this time, I thought you were just fucked up over Flower.”

Well, he wasn’t wrong about that.

“All these guys, though…this parade of jackasses. They weren’t just to distract from your thing for Marc. He was always off limits for you. He was as safe as all these guys.”

“There was nothing safe about Flower,” Matt bit back with a dry, miserable laugh. 

“He was never gonna go for you,” Bryan said with no kindness at all in his delivery. “You knew that. And it fucking hurt you—I was there—but you probably liked it because it meant you were still too-cool-to-care.” Bryan gestured roughly behind him. “None of these guys can be what you want. Which is all super convenient for you because then you never have to feel too bad about your blank skin that you hate so much.”

Matt couldn’t have denied that if his life depended on it, but he didn’t have to try because Bryan was on a roll. He pointed at his own chest. “I would be _great_ for you. I would be so good, and that fucking terrifies you.”

“We couldn’t,” Matt croaked in his own defense. This, at least, was the rule. If nothing else, they had rules to follow. “Even if we wanted to, we couldn’t. I can’t.”

Bryan looked him right in the eye. “Bull. Shit. You think team etiquette or whatever the fuck could stop us? You’re just chickenshit. A fucking coward.” 

Matt flinched back, and Bryan saw him do it. 

He sucked in an unsteady breath and shook his head again. Scrubbing his hands over his face and beard, he let a juddering laugh out into his palms. “Fuck, sorry, that was harsh. Sorry. I’m just…” He lowered his hands. “I just really wish you’d called me. Or stayed. But called me, definitely.”

They stood there in Matt’s foyer, and Matt had no good way to answer that. Because, yeah. Bryan deserved someone kind. Someone with more of a soul to share. Either Matt couldn’t offer what Bryan did, or he didn’t know how. No matter how they cut it, they would fail. Matt would fail. He wasn't cut out for this thing.

“I’m…gonna go to Sid’s thing for a little,” he heard himself say. “Make an appearance.”

Bryan nodded. His gaze had gone distant. “You should. He was asking about you. It’s why I came—to pick you up.”

Matt swallowed thickly. He needed his wallet and keys, but was he supposed to leave Rusty here in his entryway? Was he expected to go back to Sid’s with him?

Bryan stirred first, shook himself, and shot Matt a quick look. “I’m gonna head home. Got a lot to think about.”

“Yeah. Cool.” He watched Bryan turn away and reach for the doorknob, and a panicky feeling fluttered in his stomach at the sight, like this would be the last they’d see each other. Which was, of course, ridiculous. They’d see each other almost every day now that training camp was about to start. 

But that feeling didn’t fade as Bryan opened the front door and walked through it. Now was the time to speak up. To apologize. To make sure they’d be okay even if Matt couldn’t be what Bryan wanted him to be. Matt was going to be better this year, right? Get closer to the guys and to his city. Be the franchise goaltender they—

But the door shut, and Matt had said nothing.

*

By the time he pulled up at Sid’s house and wandered around back, lots of guys had gone home. With young kids to get to bed, most of the vets weren’t partiers these days. And with Shearsy, Willy, and Knuckles gone, Matt was one of the few without a family, let alone a partner. 

Still, he found Phil and Brass on the deck with a bottle of really good scotch between them and Geno on the chaise with his kid asleep along his front. Sid was nowhere in sight.

“Hey, man, good to see you,” Phil said easily, holding his hand out for a bro shake.

“What’s up, guys?” Matt answered and let himself be pulled down for a loose hug. 

Phil ruffled his hair and pushed him away. “You look good. Haven’t lost any of your hair over the summer, I see.”

Reaching up by reflex, Matt scratched his hand through it. “Yeah, I had to get a haircut, actually. It was out of control.”

“You know what’s out of control is the size of my fucking forehead,” Phil shot back. His receding hairline was covered by a hat, but it was no secret. And no source of shame. 

“Come on, you know you look fantastic.”

Next to him, Brass chuckled and pushed the bottle toward Matt. “Drink? There’s glasses inside.”

“Cool.” Matt straightened, the easy rhythm of being with his team soothing the sharp edges of the fight with Bryan. He headed for the open French doors into Sid’s house, and on the way, Geno cracked an eye open against the glare of the deck light. “Where’s Rusty?” he asked. “You not come back with him?”

“Uh.” Matt grabbed the screen door latch, stomach tensing. “He wasn’t feeling well and headed home.”

 _Personal life_ and _team_ never mixed this closely for Matt. They certainly didn’t involve the same person. The wall Matt kept between his team and his sex life felt nearly transparent right then, even if Geno’s question had been perfectly innocent. 

If Matt knew Geno at all, none of his questions were innocent. Without waiting for a follow-up, Matt slid the screen door open and retreated inside in search of a tumbler for scotch. There, he found evidence of the larger party already taken care of by Sid’s catering service—plates stacked neatly on the kitchen island, leftover chips clipped closed in their bags, and two rows of glasses lined up beside them.

Grabbing one, Matt headed back for the deck, but the sound of quiet voices caught his attention, and he detoured around a corner to find Sid on a couch…and though his view was obstructed, he’d know Anna’s legs anywhere.

It was more like a loveseat really, and the way Anna’s feet dangled over the arm, her head was most likely in Sid’s lap. Which was… a revelation. 

“You guys are staying tonight, right?” Sid asked. And that felt more normal. Sid always wanted his team to stay over. 

“Yes,” she answered. “Jetlag is worst. You can have him. He does nothing but talk about you for all last week.”

Matt could just see Sid’s face in profile, so he caught his smile down at her. “You know there’s room for both of you in that bed we bought.”

Her hand appeared by his jaw and cupped his face. “Not tonight. I want my own.” She kicked one foot against the armrest, and the crown of her head popped into view as she sat up, and Matt bolted back the way he’d come, heart pounding at what he’d just witnessed. 

Clutching his cup, he returned to the deck, took the bottle of scotch when Brass pushed it toward him, and set about getting quietly and quickly drunk.

*

He awoke sometime in the night to Sid dropping a blanket over him, and blinked blearily up at him. The sectional he’d crashed on was long and deep and soft, and Matt’s body was heavy with sleep when he said aloud, to his captain, “I saw you with her, and I heard. I don’t fucking believe it.” 

He was also probably still drunk. Which meant the anger burning slow and hot since yesterday was still smoldering, too.

Sid loomed over him, arms crossed loosely over his chest, the marks of teammates and friends curling along his thick forearms like sleeves. Maybe Anna’s was there, too. “You don’t believe it?” Sid murmured.

“Well, no I guess I do. You love fucking everybody, and everybody loves you—so much that the rules don’t even apply to you.”

Sid squatted down in front of him so they were eye-to-eye, and even though he was coming down to Matt’s level, Matt found the gesture deeply intimidating. He leaned up slightly on one elbow so at least his face wasn’t pressed into a throw pillow. 

“I keep waiting for yours to turn up on me somewhere,” Sid said, “but it hasn’t yet. So not everybody loves me.”

Matt blinked stupidly. “But you don’t even like me all that much.”

Sid shook his head, and mostly Matt hoped this was a dream, and he hadn’t just said a bunch of inappropriate shit to Sidney Fucking Crosby. This last year, he could barely say a word to anyone, and now here he was. “Murr, I love you the same as any guy on this team.” He smiled slightly. “And more than a few. But you’ve always had your own thing with Flower. Or Rusty. Or you keep to yourself.” 

“I—I do, uh.” He sputtered to a stop. “I mean, of course I fucking love you. You’re my captain.”

Sid hadn’t offered his company after Flower left, after Matt’s dad died, or after the lousy end to the season, but Matt couldn’t say he’d have welcomed it. The fact of Sid was generally enough. So when Sid put a hand on the back of his head and kissed him on the mouth—dry and chaste—Matt’s eyebrows about climbed off his forehead. 

“Maybe worry a little less about the rules,” Sid said quietly. It was supremely easy advice for Sidney Crosby to give.

He looked Matt in the eye, and Matt thought he was being serious, but there was that glint he sometimes got right before laughing his ass off at someone’s expense lurking in the corners of his eyes. 

“Sure, okay,” Matt answered dutifully. 

Sid’s knees creaked as he straightened. “Good. I’m glad you stayed over. Get some sleep.”

“Yeah, me too. Thanks for the blanket.” He tugged it up to his chin as Sid switched off the table lamp by Matt’s feet and left him to his thoughts. He didn’t get back to sleep nearly as easy this time.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks, everyone, for the wonderful feedback. I really hope you like this last part. And now, for my favorite thing, some visual inspiration. Here is [our hero](http://itstartledme.tumblr.com/post/179456115544/maljic-day-off) looking hopeful, and here are his [new tattoos.](http://itstartledme.tumblr.com/post/181274764108/the-mattytats-credit-to-snickfic-for-the) Here's his [trusty Rusty](http://sidmalkin.tumblr.com/post/179442566277/maljic-first-intermission-interview-potash) :') And here he is talking [about how important Matt is](http://ehghtyseven.tumblr.com/post/181170005503/big-love-for-muzz-from-rusty-post-game-kings-at). :'))))) If you're interested in some of the story inspo for this story, [read this.](https://www.post-gazette.com/sports/penguins/2018/09/10/matt-murray-penguins-offseason-training-camp-2018-nhl/stories/201809090232)

_September 2018_

Giving in a handful of days later, Matt shut himself in his bedroom, though there wasn’t another soul in his house, and made the call. 

“Matty? Holy shit, you never call me. Is everything okay?”

At the sound of Flower’s voice, Matt blew out a huge breath. “Yeah, sorry. I mean, sorry for not calling ever. And, uh, no. Everything’s not okay.”

“What’s going on?” His voiced tightened with worry. “Did you get hurt? I haven’t seen any—”

“No. No, it’s nothing like that. I just—I wanted to ask you something.”

Marc’s hesitance hung there for a moment and felt as wide as the continent. Which it sort of was. “Okay, shoot.”

“Is my… Uh, is my mark still there? Or has it faded by now—you’ve been gone over a year, so…” He said the last bit in a rush, all of it more difficult than he’d thought. “So, I just wondered.”

“Oh.” 

Which was all Marc needed to say. Matt could hear the answer.

“Yeah, Matty. It’s gone.”

Matt closed his eyes. And though he’d known it was the likely answer, he’d also hoped that not even a couple thousand miles could truly separate them. In the locker room, he could still spot Flower’s marks on Tanger and Sid. But they were different, more than teammates. 

Matt had thought he and Marc were different, too.

“When?” Matt asked before he could stop himself.

“Not ‘til the playoffs last year. The second round, when I thought we could go the whole way to the Final. And we did. Only then.”

Matt smiled at that, pressing his hand to his shoulder, where Flower’s mark might have been if he’d gotten one. So the whole season, basically. Marc had carried it all the way through his first season in Vegas. Maybe it had even been a comfort to him. 

“Matty?”

“Yeah,” he said, voice rough. “That’s, um. That’s really good to hear.”

“It was good to have,” Marc confirmed. “Believe me, I needed it.”

Matt ducked his head and clutched a little harder at his shoulder, hiding that smile against his hand. 

“What’s this about?” Flower asked quietly. “What’s wrong?”

He’d apologized after the mark showed up and they’d kind of fought and then kissed, and the whole team was weird about it for a while. Marc had apologized a bunch of times after that. He’d been good to Matt after he got hurt before playoffs—good to him even when Matt took his place in the playoffs _again_. And then handing him the Cup after their second win, Matt was convinced he’d never want anybody, ever, as much as he wanted Marc-Andre. That he was loved in return—that he caught glimpses of it every day in the room—made it all the more perfect and terrible, because it was so near and so far off from what he wanted.

Bryan was right. It’d have been easy to stay safe there forever. 

“I, uh. My mark turned up on Rusty. Over the summer.”

“What? That’s great, Matty! You spent a lot of time together, huh?”

“Yeah, a good bit.”

Marc paused. “What’s the problem?”

Matt gave a morose shrug to his empty room. “I didn’t get his.” He said it so quietly he wasn’t sure Marc had even heard him. 

“I see,” he said eventually. “Was it a team mark?”

“They’re always team marks for me. That’s the problem,” Matt answered, rubbing the heel of his palm against his brow bone. They would always be team marks, because who else was there? “But this is more than that. For him, too.”

“Have you talked to anybody about it? I’m sure, if it’s a—a partner mark, the team will make an exception. They will be happy to do that for you.”

“Yeah, but I still don’t know why I don’t get them. I don’t know why I can’t do it.” He bit the words out, pulse quickening with anger.

“Nobody in your family could. Right?” Marc said carefully.

“My family was fucked up. Maybe they couldn’t—or maybe they didn’t really—”

“What, love you? Come on, Matty. Somebody really smart told me one time, just because there’s not a mark doesn’t mean love isn’t there.”

Matt’s mouth twisted in a sad and bitter smile at his old words coming back to him. “I believed that for a long time, man. I thought—I thought I knew what I felt, and that was enough. I didn’t need marks to _prove_ what I felt, you know? I was so sure.” 

“Yeah, Matty. I know. And I agree.”

“It sure would be fucking nice, though, right?” he bit out. “To have it work the way it’s supposed to—to have just this one thing be easy. But it’s never going to be that way for me. Not ever.”

“I don’t know about that,” Marc said quietly, soothingly. Matt could almost see him shake his head all the way across the country. And how easy for him to do that—a safe distance from all this, his connection to Matt erased from his skin. 

The path of Matt’s anger from his gut up his throat felt like hot gravel. So rough and relentless he could hardly speak around it.

“I thought the one good thing about you leaving was that I could finally be enough on my own. It ripped me apart when you left, but I thought, at least I wouldn’t have to compare myself to you anymore. I could be enough.” He swallowed. “But I’m not. I won’t ever be enough.” 

It hurt to speak the words aloud, his throat tight and sore. He looked down at the tattoos on his forearm and hated them. What a fucking fraud he was. Thinking he could fake this for his city, his team, and his friends. For Bryan. 

“Matty…” Flower’s voice broke over the line, and Matt sniffed hard.

“Don’t say it. I don’t want to hear it.” He couldn’t bear Marc’s dutiful assurances. He’d heard so many as Flower supported him through two playoffs. Selfless and perfect and straight and married and so far out of Matt’s league. 

“Too bad, I’m going to fucking say it.” Flower’s voice sharpened, and Matt’s breath still caught at the sound. “I was just as fucked up. It wasn’t just you.”

“I know. The whole thing was fucked.”

“No, listen to me. I was fucked up, too. It _wasn’t just you._ ” He said it again like Matt was supposed to get it this time.

“What does that mean?” he asked.

“It means.” Flower made a sound of frustration. “It wasn’t just a team mark. I knew that. But I couldn’t—I was afraid what would happen if I— And there was no point. I couldn’t, but fuck, Matty, I wanted to. It wasn’t just you,” he said again, and this time Matt understood. 

He clamped his teeth together and exhaled a short laugh through his nose, rubbing a hand over his face and keeping it there, though no one could see him. The enormity and the futility of Marc-Andre’s admission stopped any words he might have in his throat.

“Matty?”

“Yeah, I’m here.” Maybe Rusty had been right about this, too, and nobody on the team was as straight as they were supposed to be. Maybe no team mark was _just_ a team mark. 

“You know we couldn’t,” Marc said. And every day of the ten years between them filled his voice with the declarative edge Matt used to jerk off to when he couldn’t sleep. 

“Yeah, I know,” Matt answered. He did. 

“I wanted you to know,” Marc pressed. “We couldn’t have, but it was never because you weren’t enough. You picked a stupid job if you want to feel safe and comfortable, Matty, but you are enough. I know it’s…harder for you,” he said. “And it’s not fair that it’s harder. But maybe they’re connected—you know, playing hockey and being gay and not having marks. Like a self-defense thing. What’s it called. A defense mechanism.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Not a new theory, but Marc didn’t need to know that. 

“Because who else are you supposed to love, right? Not those assholes on your Instagram.”

“Hey.” _They’re at least partly your fault_ , he wanted to say.

“It’s true, though! Rusty would be a huge improvement.” Marc paused, and when Matt didn’t disagree, he said, “I think the only thing that matters is if you want to take the risk. Rusty loves you enough that the universe noticed. Your mark wouldn’t be on him if you didn’t love him back.”

“You believe that, too, huh?” Matt said into the silence of his bedroom.

“I do, yeah.”

Of course, he did. It hadn’t been just Marc’s unfortunate feelings in the equation that year. Matt had obviously been head-over-heels when his headphones and sunglasses showed up on Marc’s skin. 

“What does Rusty think about all this?” Marc finally asked. 

Matt groaned. “Rusty’s pissed at me. For good reason. I messed it all up.” _I fucked around with other guys, after the mark came in. I tried to get it to go away by avoiding him._ Marc didn’t need to know that either. 

Marc clicked his tongue but didn’t offer any recrimination or judgment. Matt would have to fix it himself. 

“Can you fix it?” Marc asked. “Do you want to?”

Matt shrugged, feeling sorry for himself. “I don’t know and I don’t know.” Which was a lie. “Yeah, I want to.” Not that he knew how. Or if Bryan would listen to him.

“That’s good.” But he didn’t offer any advice. Matt found he didn’t really want any, anyway. It was nice to just talk. It felt like he and Marc were friends.

“Hey, you know about Sid, Geno, and Anna, right?” Matt blurted, jumping to his other reason for calling.

“What? What about them?” Marc said with a laugh.

“Sid had a cookout for the vets getting back in town, right? I overheard some stuff that sounded like they’re definitely all three banging. Then he didn’t deny it when I asked him about it.”

“Jeez, Matty.” Marc was still laughing.

“And, like, what the fuck, right? All this shit about team marks being so different from romantic ones, and Sid and G have probably been at it for years.”

“Not so many years,” Flower said, confirming everything. “Not until Anna.”

“Great, so he waited until G was in a committed relationship, then fucked his girl, too. Why am I the fucking problem here?”

Goddamn, it felt good to say that out loud. 

He could almost see Flower throwing his hands up. “This is why you’re the You Can Play rep, not me. And not Sid or G. Everything is changing these days, Matty. For the better. You’re a good person to have at the front of it.” 

Matt blew out a long breath, Marc’s words almost like a physical touch from across the country. They smoothed over Matt’s gravel-anger and warmed his chest like the rub his dad used to smear on him when he had a cold.

“So, you never messed around with anybody on the team? Anyone with your mark? Ever? Not even Tanger?”

“No,” Marc answered. Definitively. “We both already had partner marks. And Sid is family to me.”

“Did you want to?” Matt pressed.

“Eh,” Marc hedged. “It’s easier not to think of them like that.” He hesitated. “One impossible thing was enough for me. I’m a boring guy. It’s how I like it.”

Matt smiled to himself. “Now you’re just flattering me.”

Flower huffed. “Yes. You’re the one that got away. Or I got away. Something like that.”

“Yeah, something like that,” he agreed.

“You know, if you think Rusty would be good for you, then you have to tell him,” Marc said, voice sober again—and there was the advice Matt hadn’t asked for. “No shortcuts for you.”

“Just once I would like there to be a shortcut,” he said. “Just fucking once.” 

“You’re good at talking to me. You always were. You said some very nice stuff on TV, too.”

He could hear Marc’s smile and judge the size of it, even from Pittsburgh, his humor and his love inseparable from one another. “Don’t let it go to your head,” Matt grumbled.

“Too late! It’s already in my heart, Matty.”

“Ugh.” Matt rolled his eyes at the syrupy tone in Marc’s voice, but he couldn’t help the size of his smile either. “I’m hanging up now.”

“Hey, hold on, hold on,” Marc said, laughing. “Don’t wait so fucking long to call next time, all right? You were on my skin for more than a year, asshole.”

“All right.” Matt rubbed his shoulder again. “I love you too, man.”

*

The idea hit him like a puck to the chest and—like a shot to their new, slimmer padding—knocked the wind out of him with its directness and simplicity. The shortcut had been there all along.

The tattoos were for himself first. Reminders of his love for his father and for his team. But his dad was gone, so he’d never see his. And his team was a unit. If he wanted them to know how he felt, he had to get specific. 

The hum of the machine and the scratch of the needle vibrated down to his bones. Hypnotizing and soothing in a weird way that he’d come to learn was addictive as hell. 

When he’d gone home with the front of his shoulder bandaged and his hands shaking just a little with the need for food and a nap, he thumbed out a text before the last of the tattoo adrenalin ran out.

_Can we talk? I need to eat. Do you want to get food?_

Rusty’s answer came after what felt like a short eternity but was in fact the length of time it took Matt to inhale a banana. 

_What kind of food?_

Matt thought carefully. Bryan kept his spirit of adventure at any place Matt brought him to, but he did not actually have an adventurous palate. He liked mild foods the best whether it was Indian or Vietnamese or diner food.

 _Sandwiches?_ Matt answered. _I’ll buy if you pick up._

 _Deal!_ came the immediate response. _When?_

 _I can call it in now, if that’s cool. So…20?_ It was an off day and their friends were all on other teams now, so Rusty was likely on his couch playing video games. 

_The usual place?_ Rusty texted. The place that piled on the meat and gave Bryan extra pickles when he came in and that now knew their order when they saw either of their numbers on the caller ID.

_Yeah._

_Cool, see you in 25._

Matt sent back a thumbs up emoji and tossed down his phone. Then he went to his fridge and chugged a Gatorade. He pressed his hot, feverish arm to the cool stainless-steel door and told himself not to get his hopes up. Doing this right after getting tattooed was a bad idea, probably, but how else would he have the balls to say what he needed to? To ask what he needed to. He sure as hell wasn’t drinking this time.

He was so out of sorts, he nearly forgot that he had a dinner order to place.

*

Matt had plans to thank Rusty for coming over, for giving him a chance to make things right, but for the first twenty minutes, they sat in silence at Matt’s kitchen table and stuffed their faces. When he was done, Matt felt less like he might vibrate out of his skin, but the downside to that was he was also less likely to say what he meant. The phantom hum of the tattoo machine had receded, and his hang-ups were firmly in place.

But he’d gotten Bryan in the door. That had to count for something. And there he sat—in Matt’s kitchen, for the first time since last season, before so much had changed. It was a hot, late summer day, and Matt wanted to… Well, he wanted to climb into Bryan’s lap and lick the edge of his beard along his jaw to look for salt and a heartbeat. He wanted to touch the softness of his belly beneath that threadbare Notre Dame t-shirt.

Bryan, fearless as ever, drank the rest of his glass of water, wiped his mouth, and said, “So what did you wanna talk about?”

Matt cast a quick glance over at his counter and back to Bryan. “I wanted to…” He wanted to apologize. He wanted to apologize really quickly and skip straight to the thing he hoped would do the rest of the talking for him, if he had guts to offer it. “I wanted to, uh—”

“You know, this can just be a team mark,” Bryan interjected. “If that’d be easier, or whatever.”

“What?” Matt jerked his eyes up to Bryan’s, but his were stuck on his empty sub wrapper. 

“It can be a team mark. We don’t have to fuck. Or, like, be together at all. We’re not supposed to, anyway. It can be like with me and Knuckles. That’d be easier, for sure,” he said again.

The enormous sandwich he’d just eaten settled heavily into Matt’s gut and somehow, simultaneously pressed up into his throat. “Is that what you want?”

Bryan gave a twitchy shrug. “It doesn’t really matter what I want, does it. A mark showing up is like some kiss of death for you. Doesn’t do me much good.”

Matt glanced over at his counter again. “Fuck.”

Bryan followed his gaze and shifted in his seat. Impatient and agitated. Unhopeful. “What is it? What’s over there?”

“Fuck it.” Matt pressed up to his feet and crossed to the counter in three steps. He grabbed the two sharpies he’d dug out of his junk drawer and returned to his seat. But instead of sitting down, he dropped to his knees in front of Bryan. He figured he had about a thirty second window before Bryan gave up on him.

Might as well do it big. Actually be the man in the arena.

“What are you doing?” Bryan sat back in his chair. When Matt grabbed his own shirt collar and pulled it off over his head, he sat back even farther. “Fuck, what are you _doing?_ ” 

Holding the pens in his fist, he pressed them to Bryan’s knee. “I’m not gonna get your mark, Bry. It’s not going to happen. But, uh. If you trust me to love you enough, you can put one on me anyway.” He looked up and offered the sharpies. Bryan accepted them, but he wasn’t looking at them.

“What is that?” he asked, tilting his chin at Matt’s bandaged shoulder. 

Matt reached for the tape and peeled it back with his thumb. The bandage stuck to his skin with thick lubricant, but it came away mostly clean—only a little blood and ink. The tattoo was fucking beautiful—a stark black fleur de lis over the swell of muscle on the front of his shoulder. 

“Is that…for Flower?”

Matt nodded. “I should’ve gotten it as soon as he got his mark.” He squeezed his hand around Bryan’s, holding the pens tighter. “The next one’s yours if you want it.”

Bryan finally looked at him, his gaze flicking up from Matt’s shoulder. “What?”

“If you want it to just be a team thing, I—I’ll understand. But I—”

“Wait, what?” 

“Come on—fuck, just tell me—”

Bryan slid out of his chair and half into Matt’s lap, a sharp laugh gusting across his face as he grabbed Matt into a hard hug. “Oh my god— _Matt_." He squeezed tighter and pressed a kiss to Matt's temple. "Why didn’t you say something? I thought—I thought you’d invited me over to tell me to fuck off.”

Tentatively, Matt tightened his arms the whole way around Bryan’s middle. When Bryan rubbed up and down his spine, Matt pressed his brow into his shoulder. “Come on, you know me better than that,” he said, voice smothered in Bryan’s shirt. “I’d just ghost you.”

Bryan huffed. “You did ghost me, asshole. I must not be thinking straight.” He tried to pull back, but Matt held on tight. 

“You’ve had some stuff on your mind, huh?” He turned his face against Bryan’s neck and inhaled the scent of his soap and his sweat. He smelled like team. Like everything Matt had ever wanted and never, ever thought he could have.

Bryan’s hands slid across Matt’s bare back, his fingers digging restlessly at his sides. “You have no idea. I wanted to come over and yell at you and, like, hold you down and _make_ you see me. It was a little dark.”

Matt shivered as Bryan’s blunt fingernails dug between his ribs. “Shit, if you wanna do that sometime, or right now…”

Laughing, Bryan finally turned just enough to kiss the hinge of Matt’s jaw. “I had this whole thing I was gonna tell you about dating somebody your own age, and how it’d help you to act your age for once, but it was kinda preachy, and I was mad at you, and I’m regretting telling you any of this, right now.”

Matt gave in and tasted the side of Bryan’s throat, right at the edge of his beard, and Bryan tipped his head back and groaned. “What do you wanna do now?” Matt asked, voice rumbling against Bryan’s skin. 

Bryan gripped Matt’s face in both hands and muscled him back so they were eye-to-eye. “I’ve wanted to fuck you since August. Since the day I woke up in that bed and you were gone.”

Matt burned up in the space of one breath, his whole body catching fire. Bryan held his gaze and hardly blinked. “Too much, too soon? Or does that sound okay?” he said.

Matt nodded. “Fucking awesome.”

“I mean, the universe has already spoken, right?”

“Right. Totally.” 

They both bolted for the stairs in the same moment, like Coach had blown a fucking whistle.

Matt climbed them two at a time, Bryan hot on his heels all the way inside his bedroom. They didn’t need much space to strip, so they gave each other none, shoving shirts and underwear out of the way, grasping and holding, biting and kissing down onto the bed where Bryan crawled into Matt’s lap.

“Scoot back,” he said breathlessly. “Against the wall.”

It was an upholstered headboard, so the faux leather made Matt twitch and shiver as he came up against it. He liked that Bryan loomed over him on his knees. He liked a guy who knew what he wanted in bed. He always had.

“I’ve been practicing,” Bryan said, not quite looking at him. “Since last time. I’m good to go.”

“Cool,” Matt answered by reflex, getting his hands on Bryan’s thick waist and squeezing. “Wait, practicing for what?” But Bryan’s knees were spread across his thighs, and he reached toward Matt’s bedside table like he knew what he was after. 

“Is your stuff in here?” he asked, yanking open the top drawer. He came out with Matt’s lube and a strip of condoms. “Found it.”

Matt watched him drip lubricant on his fingers and reach behind himself and only just managed to croak, “Are you sure about this?”

Bryan nodded. “Heck yeah. I’m ready to take this whole not-straight thing to the next level.” 

He squirmed a little, squinting in concentration, and Matt was nearly overcome with his feelings. He touched Bryan’s sides and leaned up from the headboard to kiss Bryan’s chest. “You might be skipping a couple levels,” he said, rubbing his nose through Bryan’s chest hair. 

Ducking down, Bryan nudged noses and kissed him. “I know you’ll make it good for me, babe.”

Matt tipped his chin up into the kiss and nodded. He felt Bryan grinning.

*

Moments like this, Matt tried hard not to be a spectator, but he wasn’t sure he succeeded. It was just—Bryan braced over him, halfway down onto his dick, flushed and swearing under his breath captured a _lot_ of his attention. Mostly, Matt just clasped Bryan’s arms, said encouraging things, and made sure not to thrust up by accident.

He should have taken charge and made sure Bryan was ready for this, or at least interrogated him a bit further on what his “practice” had included.

But, with one hand against the headboard and the other hooked back over Matt’s drawn-up knee, Bryan looked like he was enjoying himself. He breathed and worked on relaxing and inched down until he came flush against Matt’s body and exhaled in a rush. “Fuck me,” he said tipping forward against Matt’s chest. “I mean, don’t yet. Don’t move.”

Matt clenched his teeth at the hot grip of Bryan’s body but nodded. “I wasn’t gonna.” Bryan’s dick was soft against Matt’s lower belly, and neither of them moved to address it. He wasn’t sure he’d ever held someone like this. Just quiet like this. From here, the outline of Pegasus was right-side up, and Matt took this moment of stillness to trace the constellation with his fingers. It was beautiful and huge and his. His proof that Bryan loved him. He smiled when Bryan shivered at the light touch. “You okay?” he asked.

“Think so,” Bryan answered. He adjusted his knees, and Matt felt him relax a little further. “I’ve wanted to know for a while now, what this felt like. To have somebody in me. You know?”

“Yeah.” Matt kissed Bryan’s shoulder, then the side of his neck. “I made sure to find out as quick as I could.”

“How old were you?”

“Seventeen.”

“And him?”

Matt pushed him gently back. “Why do you wanna know?”

Bryan shook his head. “I don’t, sorry. It doesn’t matter.”

Leaning up to kiss him, Matt said against his lips, “Is it okay if I touch you now?”

“Yeah, fuck,” Bryan said on an exhale. “Please.”

Matt reached between them and took hold of Bryan’s soft dick. He held it carefully in his hand and listened for Bryan’s breath to stutter and catch—which it did right as he began to thicken. They fucked just like that—Bryan so still in his lap and hunched toward him, Matt propped against the headboard and feeling every micromovement in Bryan’s body.

“Can I just try—” Matt said, voice tight as he clenched his ass and flexed up just slightly.

Bryan closed his eyes, moaned, and gripped both Matt’s biceps.

“Does it feel good?” Matt asked.

Bryan nodded. “Just like that. Just that.”

It was agonizingly slow, but at least Matt could hold on that way and make sure Bryan got his first—finally moving in tiny increments, feeling his way along as Matt brought him off with his hand and a glacial roll of his hips. Bryan clamped down on him and ducked his head, a rough sound escaping his throat as he shuddered. When Matt finally slipped over the edge after him, Bryan’s boneless weight held him down. Just like he’d promised.

*

Bryan lay half on top of him and tapped the cap-end of the sharpie against Matt’s breastbone. It made a hollow, echoing sound in his ears.

“Okay, one, I’m a terrible artist,” Bryan said. “Fair warning. And, two, I know this is gonna be my mark, but it’s supposed to be the moment you knew you loved me. And I don’t know when that was.”

Matt wasn’t sure, either, to be honest. It was supposed to be part of the magic—sometimes you only realized the moment it appeared on your skin. 

After his mark had shown up on Flower’s shoulder, Matt had comforted himself imagining when Marc had looked at him with his headphones and sunglasses on and loved him. Which plane or bus ride. Which hustle through the airport and across the tarmac. In the dead of night after a win or a loss, or at the ass-crack of dawn, shuffling out of a hotel in his sweats. He’d never asked, obviously.

Matt would never have said he had a romantic soul—or even a single bone in his body, and Rusty had to know that. Had to love him in spite of that.

He thought back to the summer. Dumo’s wedding in August and the week Bryan had spent at Matt’s lake house. His feelings for Bryan were an accumulation of all of it—and the two years before that. The repeated evidence that Bryan cared enough to seek Matt out and stick with him, when Matt had spent most of his life avoiding risk. Side-stepping any possibility of this, right here.

“I’m not sure there’s much of it that can be represented artistically,” he finally said. “I play my cards pretty close to the vest.” 

Bryan gave him some kind of look—suspicion or skepticism or disappointment or a combination. And replaying what he’d just said, Matt winced internally. Flower would probably tell him to put on his big-boy underpants and quit being an asshole for once. 

“I don’t know what the universe would have picked,” he answered more honestly. 

“Do you have some finalists?” Bryan asked.

Matt nodded. “Yeah.” He smiled. “You on top of me saying, _Yippee-ki-yay_. That’s right up there.”

Bryan’s mouth pinched as he held in a laugh, a flush rising up his neck. But he nodded and with great concentration, wrote out the words in a circle around Matt’s left nipple. His handwriting was atrocious, but Matt liked the feel of the cool, wet marker tip on his skin. 

“Standing with you by the railing at Dumo’s wedding and looking at the ocean. That, uh. That meant a lot to me.” 

Bryan nodded and scooted a little farther down Matt’s body. Biting his bottom lip, he drew what might have been a patio and railing. Beyond it, the wavy lines were probably the ocean, and— “Is that the moon?”

“Mm-hm,” he answered.

“Was the moon out that night?”

“Yup. Don’t you remember?”

“I was mostly looking at you.” He said it with just a hint of mockery in his voice, though he wasn’t sure who he was mocking.

Bryan looked up from his terrible drawing with one of those happy, surprised smiles lighting up his eyes. “You’re such a romantic,” he said. “I’ve always liked that about you.”

“You have?” Matt blurted and immediately regretted. Rusty’s sarcasm was sometimes difficult to detect because he tended to be so genuine. Matt was having trouble identifying his own sarcasm in this conversation, too.

Bryan laughed. “Yeah,” he said, as though it were obvious. “You fall in love with half your team, so you date assholes to protect your big, mushy heart. The universe gives you nothing, so you spell it out on your skin yourself.”

“I think that first part is you, not me,” Matt choked out.

“ _And_ you’re willing to put this stuff on yourself permanently, when I haven’t made that kind of promise to you. A soul mark isn’t that kind of promise.” He sat up and gestured at his artwork. On his own skin, Knuckles’ mark had almost completely faded, all the evidence either of them needed that nothing was permanent. “What made you change your mind?” he asked quietly. “I thought we were done before we’d even started.”

Matt looked down at Bryan’s artwork, ugly and black across his torso. He fucking loved it. “I’d always trusted what I felt,” he said. “Or, I mean, I got so I did. After some shit, you know?” Rusty nodded. “But it fucking sucks to see somebody else’s feelings validated, and not your own. And then for it to happen again. And to not know why other than…I just suck at what comes easy to everybody else.”

Bryan’s brow creased in a frown, but Matt pushed the rest out. “I really didn’t wanna suck at this with you. Not when you’d put yourself at risk for me, with no guarantee that I’d…" He shook his head and took a breath. "But you’ve trusted me with a lot for a long time, so. Bring it, I guess.”

Bryan’s frown lifted into a smile. “Ooh, competitive trusting,” he said. “I could be into that.” Matt laughed, and Bryan did, too, spreading a hand across his drawings. “But you’re not really gonna get these tattooed on you, right? I’m not sure this is my best work. Or, shit, what if it is?”

Matt grinned. “I figure the artist can clean it up when I go get it done. And some of it should probably match where your mark is on your back, right?”

So Rusty was probably right about him. Not only was Matt a romantic, he was a sap. There were way worse revelations to be had naked, in bed with a teammate. In bed with a Bryan, specifically.

Bryan leaned down and pressed a kiss to Matt’s unmarked side with all the reverence the universe deserved. Except this was just for them, so that reverence was for him. For Matt’s skin. “Can you think of any others?” he asked. “I’m just finding my groove, here.”

Matt could think of plenty.

“And, uh.” Rusty gave a jittery laugh. “If you wanna do some on me, too, that’d be cool. I’ve got some ideas.”

Unable to speak, but for once not bothered by it, Matt tangled their legs together, rolled Bryan under him, and kissed him on the mouth. 

They got marker all over the sheets.

 

End.

I don’t wanna have to make you  
Show me how you do it  
I've been looking all night

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr!](http://itstartledme.tumblr.com/)


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